Thank- you Follow- up

[danny boy]

I have decided to do a Thank- you Follow- up to be sent out within the week of artwork being picked up. Cards, letters or notes I am not sure which way to go. My handwriting skills are marginal so I am leary of a handwriten note and time is a factor. I can generate one off of the computer? I am open to all kinds of suggestions.
Thanks

 

[fourcorners]

We do a little card with our logo on it. Hand-written message with a business card and a 10% discount on their next order.

 

[elsa]

I know it takes time but there is just nothing like a hand written note. Makes it personal, makes the recepiant feel like you took time just for them!
At the very least go ahead and print up something nice but add a short personal note and your signature. Go for the card-letters look too much like junk mail!

Elsa

 

[Baer Charlton]

But make sure you use a rubber stamp for your signiture so they know it's you... just joking.

Nothing beats a nice little card. Custom printed and a short jotted note.

Take your time with the jotting and it will be fine...

People will forgive a whole lot of bad handwriting these days, as long as they can read it... it's special.

 

[Puppyraiser]

Instead of a percent off, give a dollar amount off. It is surprising how many people read them as the same, so you get the credit either way. We print up business card size coupons on Micro Publisher in varying amounts depending on what they spend. $10 for $200, $15 for $300, etc up to $50 for $1000. I keep these people in a database, with number of frames sold and number of cards of each denomination sent. It is amazing to me that we have sent them to over 400 DIFFERENT people in the year plus we have been keeping track. I never would have believed it! The cards insert into a thank you note from Abbott, so they get "grateful for your business" words printed and a note "We enjoyed framing your lovely _______" Roger & Ellen Collins. We get about 20% back. One guy wanted to know if he could use two $50 cards on a single order. Oh, yes... that meant he had spent at least $2000 recently. Of COURSE you can! (Still got another $300 out of him...) He was sooo tickled!

 

[Bill Henry-]

If you want “handwritten” notes printed from you computer, you can do it.

Contact Signature Software. You can download a form onto which you write or print certain words and phrases and send it to them to be digitized. For about 100 bucks, you can have your very own script immortalized for access in your font menu.

 

[Ron Eggers]

Hand-written notes are lovely and thoughtful, but I really believe that there are some of us - habitual computer-users, mostly - whose handwriting is so hideous that the recipient of a hand-written note may believe we are seriously impaired. They may be afraid to trust us with any future work requiring manual skills.

In these cases, you could hire somebody with beautiful penmanship to write the notes or just have the computer do it.

Just don't address it to "Dear Occupant."

 

[Meghan MacMillan]

I was going to type essentially the same thing that Elsa said. Okay to type/print a note if your handwriting really is challenging but add something handwritten, even if it's just "Thanks again" and sign by hand.

Short of Bill's source digitizing your own handwriting there are lots of handwriting fonts available at fontgarden.com. If this style is less formal than your store's overall image skip it but please, please, please do not use Times New Roman with the inserted information bolded.

As for the coupon one tip I picked up from Bill McCurry and have used successfully is to use the words Gift Certificate rather than coupon or discount . We follow up with a thank you note and a gift certificate. Sometimes we put two gift certificates in the envelope and invite them to pass one on to a friend or neighbor. Ours are also business card sized.

 

[danny boy]

Thanks for all of the great ideas... I purchased some blank note cards today which I will inprint with the gallery logo. Now I just need to sweet talk DeAnne (my wife) about the hand written thing. See what a great wealth of information is at our finger tips?

 

[Sister]

Meghan, love that site you posted. Times New Roman is good; so is Arial and Comic Sans. We found gift certificates or $$$ amounts are much better than percentages. I guess it is a lot psychological.